Ah, child birthing class. Everyone says you need to take one...and for the most part, they're right. We opted for the two part evening version rather than waste a whole Saturday cramming it all in. And I have to say, it was relatively painless - even with the graphic videos of various types of births. I walked away amazed that my body will be able to do this...Mike walked away making sure I was going to be getting an epidural.
Here are a few observations from the class:
1. Mike will be a great birthing partner...but getting me to relax will not be his strong suit.
I know he'll keep me motivated, he'll make me laugh, and he'll be there to support me. I'm just not expecting him to be amazing at getting me to focus, relax and breathe. At one point in the class when we were supposed to be breathing through a contraction and he was supposed to be massaging my legs, I opened my eyes and he was gazing out the window, probably wondering what the Cubs score was...then another time he rolled his eyes dramatically just to make me laugh. (which it did and we launched into a huge giggle fit in the middle of it all.) Again, he'll be great and we'll figure it out, but like I said, getting me to relax will a) not be easy and b) is not his thing.
2. Epidurals are given out like Advil....and if you are not a hippie weirdo, you get one.
Cedars Sinai, where I will be giving birth, has a 95% epidural rate. That was one of the first things our instructor told us. Then she showed two videos - one had the couples doing "natural child birth" with no epidurals. They were pretty unattractive, had very little personality, and did not seem like people anyone in the room would be friends with. (But she got that kid out after what seemed like many, many hours!) And then the second video was the couple that got the epidural. I think there might have been birds chirping in the background...they were both attractive, athletic, and I don't think a moment of discomfort crossed her face. Strange...I wonder what they were trying to tell us here...
3. Cesareans are serious surgery.
At the second class they showed a full cesarean procedure. It was fast (5 minutes from first incision to baby's cry) but man, it just seemed so clinical and a bit scary. However, as the instructor said, the c-section rate at Cedars is around 37% so you can't ignore that its a real possibility. And as my friend Nicolle (who just had a cesarean for her breech baby) told me, "when it comes time, you'll want to get that baby out anyway you can." And they did make it clear that Cedars will not do cesareans "out of convenience" since they are not the safest way to give birth...I guess she meant that they don't do them for people like us, just for Britney Spears.
4. Just say no to the placenta.
In one of the videos, the doctor walked over to the woman just after she had the baby with the placenta in a tray and invited her to inspect it to make sure it was all intact. The look on her face was priceless - she was completely disgusted...and so was Mike. I think he'll be making sure that our little placenta is whisked away and we pretend it never existed.
So we're excited and nervous and overall as ready as we can be...although Mike is asking if there is another class we can take that explains what the heck to do with this thing once we take it home...
(P.S. I promise to put up some photos in the next day or so - I have a few on my camera that I just need to download and post. They are coming!)
